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Electra or Elektra ( / Elektra) is a Greek
Ancient Greece

The term Ancient Greece refers to the period of History of Greece lasting from the Greek Dark Ages ca. 1100 BC and the Dorian invasion, to 146 BC and the Roman Republic conquest of Greece after the Battle of Corinth ....
 tragic
Tragedy

Tragedy is a form of The arts based on human suffering that offers its audience pleasure. While most cultures have developed forms that provoke this paradoxical response, tragedy refers to a specific Poetic tradition of drama that has played a unique and important role historically in the self-definition of Western culture....
 play by Sophocles
Sophocles

Sophocles was the second of the three classical Greece tragedy whose work has survived. His first plays were written later than those of Aeschylus and earlier than those of Euripides....
. Its date is not known, but various stylistic similarities with the Philoctetes
Philoctetes

In Greek mythology, Philoctetes was the son of King Poeas of Meliboea in Thessaly. He was a Greek hero, famed as an archer, and was a participant in the Trojan War....
 (409 BC) and the Oedipus at Colonus
Oedipus at Colonus

Oedipus at Colonus is one of the three Theban plays of the Athenian tragedian Sophocles. It was written shortly before Sophocles' death in 406 BC and produced by his grandson at the Festival of Dionysus in 401 BC....
 (401 BC) lead scholars to suppose that it was written towards the end of Sophocles' career.

Set in the city of Argos
Argos

Argos is a city in Greece in the Peloponnese near Nafplion, which was its historic harbour, named for Nauplius ....
 a few years after the Trojan war
Trojan War

In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy stole Helen from her husband Menelaus, the king of Sparta....
, it is based around the character of Electra
Electra

In Greek mythology, Electra was an Argosian princess and daughter of King Agamemnon and Queen Clytemnestra, and was a sibling to sisters Iphigeneia, Chrysothemis, and brother Orestes....
, and the vengeance that she and her brother Orestes
Orestes

Orestes was the son of Agamemnon in Greek mythology; Orestes may also refer to:Drama*Orestes , an Classical Athens tragedy from 408 BCE by Euripides...
 take on their mother Clytaemnestra and step father Aegisthus
Aegisthus

In Greek mythology, Aegisthus was the son of Thyestes and of his daughter, Pelopia.Thyestes felt he had been deprived of the Mycenae throne unfairly by his brother, Atreus....
 for the murder of their father, Agamemnon
Agamemnon

In Greek mythology, Agamemnon / is the son of King Atreus of Mycenae and Queen Aerope, the brother of Menelaus and the husband of Clytemnestra; different mythological versions make him the king either of Mycenae or of Argos....
.

Background
When King Agamemnon
Agamemnon

In Greek mythology, Agamemnon / is the son of King Atreus of Mycenae and Queen Aerope, the brother of Menelaus and the husband of Clytemnestra; different mythological versions make him the king either of Mycenae or of Argos....
 returns from the Trojan War
Trojan War

In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy stole Helen from her husband Menelaus, the king of Sparta....
 with his new concubine, Cassandra
Cassandra

In Greek mythology, Cassandra was the daughter of King Priam and Queen Hecuba of Troy. Her beauty caused Apollo to grant her the gift of prophecy....
, his wife Clytemnestra
Clytemnestra

Clytemnestra was the wife of Agamemnon, king of the Ancient Greece kingdom of Mycenae or Argos. In the Oresteia by Aeschylus, she was a femme fatale who murdered her husband, Agamemnon—said by Euripides to be her second husband—and his concubine Cassandra....
 (who has taken Agamemnon's cousin Aegisthus
Aegisthus

In Greek mythology, Aegisthus was the son of Thyestes and of his daughter, Pelopia.Thyestes felt he had been deprived of the Mycenae throne unfairly by his brother, Atreus....
 as a lover) kills them.






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Electra or Elektra ( / Elektra) is a Greek
Ancient Greece

The term Ancient Greece refers to the period of History of Greece lasting from the Greek Dark Ages ca. 1100 BC and the Dorian invasion, to 146 BC and the Roman Republic conquest of Greece after the Battle of Corinth ....
 tragic
Tragedy

Tragedy is a form of The arts based on human suffering that offers its audience pleasure. While most cultures have developed forms that provoke this paradoxical response, tragedy refers to a specific Poetic tradition of drama that has played a unique and important role historically in the self-definition of Western culture....
 play by Sophocles
Sophocles

Sophocles was the second of the three classical Greece tragedy whose work has survived. His first plays were written later than those of Aeschylus and earlier than those of Euripides....
. Its date is not known, but various stylistic similarities with the Philoctetes
Philoctetes

In Greek mythology, Philoctetes was the son of King Poeas of Meliboea in Thessaly. He was a Greek hero, famed as an archer, and was a participant in the Trojan War....
 (409 BC) and the Oedipus at Colonus
Oedipus at Colonus

Oedipus at Colonus is one of the three Theban plays of the Athenian tragedian Sophocles. It was written shortly before Sophocles' death in 406 BC and produced by his grandson at the Festival of Dionysus in 401 BC....
 (401 BC) lead scholars to suppose that it was written towards the end of Sophocles' career.

Set in the city of Argos
Argos

Argos is a city in Greece in the Peloponnese near Nafplion, which was its historic harbour, named for Nauplius ....
 a few years after the Trojan war
Trojan War

In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy stole Helen from her husband Menelaus, the king of Sparta....
, it is based around the character of Electra
Electra

In Greek mythology, Electra was an Argosian princess and daughter of King Agamemnon and Queen Clytemnestra, and was a sibling to sisters Iphigeneia, Chrysothemis, and brother Orestes....
, and the vengeance that she and her brother Orestes
Orestes

Orestes was the son of Agamemnon in Greek mythology; Orestes may also refer to:Drama*Orestes , an Classical Athens tragedy from 408 BCE by Euripides...
 take on their mother Clytaemnestra and step father Aegisthus
Aegisthus

In Greek mythology, Aegisthus was the son of Thyestes and of his daughter, Pelopia.Thyestes felt he had been deprived of the Mycenae throne unfairly by his brother, Atreus....
 for the murder of their father, Agamemnon
Agamemnon

In Greek mythology, Agamemnon / is the son of King Atreus of Mycenae and Queen Aerope, the brother of Menelaus and the husband of Clytemnestra; different mythological versions make him the king either of Mycenae or of Argos....
.

Background


When King Agamemnon
Agamemnon

In Greek mythology, Agamemnon / is the son of King Atreus of Mycenae and Queen Aerope, the brother of Menelaus and the husband of Clytemnestra; different mythological versions make him the king either of Mycenae or of Argos....
 returns from the Trojan War
Trojan War

In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy stole Helen from her husband Menelaus, the king of Sparta....
 with his new concubine, Cassandra
Cassandra

In Greek mythology, Cassandra was the daughter of King Priam and Queen Hecuba of Troy. Her beauty caused Apollo to grant her the gift of prophecy....
, his wife Clytemnestra
Clytemnestra

Clytemnestra was the wife of Agamemnon, king of the Ancient Greece kingdom of Mycenae or Argos. In the Oresteia by Aeschylus, she was a femme fatale who murdered her husband, Agamemnon—said by Euripides to be her second husband—and his concubine Cassandra....
 (who has taken Agamemnon's cousin Aegisthus
Aegisthus

In Greek mythology, Aegisthus was the son of Thyestes and of his daughter, Pelopia.Thyestes felt he had been deprived of the Mycenae throne unfairly by his brother, Atreus....
 as a lover) kills them. Clytemnestra believes the adultery was justified, since Agamemnon had sacrificed their daughter Iphigeneia
Iphigeneia

Iphigenia is a daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra in Greek mythology. In Attic accounts, Iphigenia is sometimes called a daughter of Theseus and Helen raised by Agamemnon and Clytemnestra....
 before the war, as commanded by the gods. Electra
Electra

In Greek mythology, Electra was an Argosian princess and daughter of King Agamemnon and Queen Clytemnestra, and was a sibling to sisters Iphigeneia, Chrysothemis, and brother Orestes....
, daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, rescued her young, twin brother Orestes
Orestes

Orestes was the son of Agamemnon in Greek mythology; Orestes may also refer to:Drama*Orestes , an Classical Athens tragedy from 408 BCE by Euripides...
 from her mother by sending him to Strophius of Phocis. The play begins years later when Orestes has returned as a grown man with a plot for revenge, as well as to claim the throne.

Storyline


Orestes arrives with his friend Pylades
Pylades

In Greek mythology, Pylades is the son of King Strophius of Phocis and is mostly known for his strong friendship or homosexual relationship with Orestes ....
, son of Strophius, and a paedagogus, i.e. tutor (an old attendant of Orestes, who took him from Electra to Strophius). Their plan is to have the tutor announce that Orestes has died in a chariot accident, and that two men (really Orestes and Pylades) are arriving shortly to deliver an urn with his remains.

Electra laments over her father, first on her own, then (in lyrics) with the newly-arrived chorus. She bitterly argues first with her sister Chrysothemis
Chrysothemis

In Greek mythology, Chrysothemis was a daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra. Unlike her sister, Electra, Chrysothemis did not protest or enact vengeance against their mother for having an affair with Aegisthus and then killing their father....
 over her accommodation with her father's killers, and then with her mother over her father's murder. Her only hope is that one day her brother will return to avenge him. When the messenger arrives with news of the death of Orestes, Clytemnestra is relieved to hear it. Electra however is devastated. Chrysothemis then enters: she has seen some offerings at the tomb of Agamemnon and (correctly) concludes that Orestes has returned. Electra dismisses her arguments, sure that Orestes is now dead. She suddenly turns to her sister with a proposal to kill Aegisthus, but Chrysothemis refuses to help, pointing out the impracticability of the plan.

After a choral ode Orestes arrives, carrying the urn supposedly containing his ashes. He does not recognize Electra, nor she him. He gives her the urn and she delivers a moving lament over it, unaware that her brother is in fact standing alive next to her. Now realizing the truth, Orestes reveals his identity to his emotional sister. She is overjoyed that he is alive, but in their excitement they nearly reveal his identity, and the tutor comes out from the palace to urge them on. Orestes and Pylades enter the house and slay his mother Clytemnestra. As Aegisthus returns home, they quickly put her corpse under a sheet and present it to him as the body of Orestes. He lifts the veil to discover who it really is, and Orestes then reveals himself. They escort Aegisthus off set to be killed at the hearth, the same location Agamemnon was slain. The play ends here, before the death of Aegisthus is announced.

Similar works


The story of Orestes' revenge was told at the end of the lost epic Nostoi
Nostoi

The Nostoi is a lost Epic poetry of ancient Greek literature. It was one of the Epic Cycle, that is, the "Trojan" cycle, which told the entire history of the Trojan War in epic verse....
, and the events are also brought up in the Odyssey
Odyssey

The Odyssey is one of two major ancient Hellenic civilization epic poetrys attributed to Homer. It is, in part, a sequel to the Iliad, the other work traditionally ascribed to Homer....
. It was a popular subject in Greek tragedies, and there are surviving versions from all three of the great Athenian tragedians: Aeschylus
Aeschylus

Aeschylus was an Ancient Greece playwright. He is often recognized as the father or the founder of tragedy, and is the earliest of the three Greek tragedy whose Play survive extant, the others being Sophocles and Euripides....
, Sophocles, and Euripides
Euripides

Euripides was the last of the three great tragedy of classical Athens . Ancient scholars thought that Euripides had written ninety-five plays, although four of those were probably written by Critias....
. The first and largest is the Libation Bearers in the Oresteia Trilogy by Aeschylus (458 BC). Euripides wrote an Electra play
Electra (Euripides)

Euripides' Electra was probably written in the mid 410s BC, likely after 413 BC. It is unclear whether it was first produced before or after Sophocles' Electra of the Electra story....
. He tells a very different version of this same basic story as Sophocles despite them being written in close proximity around the same time.

Translations

  • Lewis Campbell
    Lewis Campbell

    Lewis Campbell , United Kingdom classical scholar, was born in Edinburgh, Scotland.His father, Robert Campbell, Royal Navy, was a first cousin of Thomas Campbell, the poet....
    , 1883 - verse
  • Richard C. Jebb, 1904 - prose:
  • Francis Storr, 1912 - verse
  • Francis Fergusson
    Francis Fergusson

    Francis Fergusson was an USA academic and critic, a theorist of drama and mythology. Fergusson taught for a time on the faculty of the department of English at Rutgers University and is regarded as an influence on poet Robert Pinsky....
    , 1938 - verse
  • E.F. Watling 1953 - prose
  • David Grene, 1957 - verse
  • H. D. F. Kitto
    H. D. F. Kitto

    Humphrey Davey Findley Kitto was a British classical scholar of Cornish people ancestry. He was born in Stroud, Gloucestershire.He was educated at the The Crypt School, Gloucester and St....
    , 1962 - verse
  • J. H. Kells, 1973 - verse
  • Frank McGuinness
    Frank McGuinness

    Frank McGuinness is an award-winning Irish playwright, translation and poet....
    , 1997 - verse
  • Henry Taylor, 1998 - verse
  • Anne Carson, 2001 - verse
  • Jenny March, 2001 - prose (acting edition)
  • G.Theodoridis, 2006 - prose:


Adaptations

  • Hugo von Hofmannsthal
    Hugo von Hofmannsthal

    Hugo von Hofmannsthal , was an Austrian novelist, libretto, poet, dramatist, narrator, and essayist....
    , 1903
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